Space Barley: Have A Beer…From Space…Not Really

December 5, 2009

There are a couple brands of beer that I regularly drink. And they're awesome. However, none of them are from space. Neither is the Space Barley. But you gotta admit - they have a good angle going. And maker Sapporo Breweries is going to milk it to death.

While it's not technically "beer from space," the limited-edition flavor does have a few things going for it. The barley that was used to make the beer were apparently descended from seeds that spent some amount of time in space, as part of a 2006 experiment where astronauts tried to grow real food while floating in zero gravity.

So, did the barley undergo any special mutation while out of the earth's confines? Ummm, not really. But it did spend time in space. Which is all the angle Sapporo needed to begin calling the breed "space barley." And their resulting product the "space beer." If you drink it, you can potentially get "space drunk." And when you relieve yourself, you could be discharging "space pee." When you flush, all that "space pee" falls into the sewer to produce "space sewer water." Yeah, it's pretty fabulous.

Space Barley, the beer, is brewed from roasted malt that is made completely with fourth-generation "space barley." The beverage features a slightly dark color ("that evokes an image of cosmic space"), a mellow fragrance and a distinctive roasted taste. It comes in a standard 330ml bottle, which is sold in packs of six.

A limited-edition blend, Sapporo is only making 250 boxes of the Space Barley, with purchase limited to one box per person at 10,000 Yen. All proceeds will go to Okayama University for space research.